Institutional Advancement Fellows

The Institutional Advancement Office recently appointed Bulbul Ahammed as an Advancement Fellow to help with development-related projects. He will serve as a liaison between Advancement and alumni, donors, and friends of MIIS. Some projects to look forward to include videos, blogs, and articles detailing exciting student experiences. Read more about our impressive Fellow below and stay tuned!

Big congrats to my fellow 2009 MIIS GSIPM winter graduates.

The ceremony was short and sweet and the reception was even sweeter.  The Golden State Theatre set the tone for the FIRST EVER graduating class of GSIPM (the new combined Graduate School of International Policy AND Management, formerly GSIPS and The Fisher School of Business) as well as GSTILE (Graduate School of Translation, Interpretation and Language Education). 

Daniel Stolkowski gave us a great speech and represented the student body very well with appropriate humor and recognitions.  President Ramaswamy and Prof. Oliva offered encouraging words and inspiring stories.

As I try on my postgraduate alumni hat for the first time I know that I will not soon leave The Monterey Institute behind.  Despite an initial intention to get in and get out in three semesters, I have found myself putting on the brakes, trying to extend my time on the peninsula and in our enclave of bright international academic stars. 

Although I am very eager to rejoin the workforce and apply my new tools in the field, I have also realized how much I cherish the intimate community and unique setting in which we grow here.  As an avid fan of personal and community evolution I expect to continue growing as a MIIS alum. 

After a holiday vacation with family and friends in CO, PA and NYC, I will be glad to return to Monterey, CA and patiently yet strategically plan my post-graduation re-entry into the international workforce.  Although I cannot say exactly where I will be six months from now, I am confident and ambitious in planning a prosperous future of doing good and doing well.

Cheers to the entire MIIS community and thank you all for being great family.  From the Monterey Bay to your current coordinates, a big salute from the Graduating Class of Winter 2009.

Tonight, students from the China Factor will unveil a series of scenarios that will describe the China we may see in 20 years.

As part of a course discussing the rapidly evolving role of China in the contemporary world, discussion of what the future holds for this rising global power is necessarily difficult. When I started my studies at the institute in the fall of 2007, I had no idea that I would spend the next summer in the Russian Far East or that I would witness the unfolding of the 2008-2009 financial crisis just as I began the first semester of my MBA finance course.

However, through a partnership with a prominent Bay Area consulting firm and MIIS faculty, my class and I undertook the task of describing potential scenarios for China in 2030. We based these scenarios on two driving forces, in our case the state of good/bad Sino-American relations and a low/high degree of fossil fuel reliance. Out of those four possibilities, I picked a world in which China and the US are very cooperative but are also both reliant on imported fossil fuels.

As someone long accustomed to reading dire warnings of China’s exponential increases in energy consumption clashing with the USA, I initially viewed the scenario as unlikely to say the least. It could in a sense describe the current state, but with more cars, airports, people, and less oil in 20 years, it was hard to see how that pressure would not cause serious fissures between Beijing and Washington.

Going through the methodology our training provided us, I fleshed out what about the scenario would have to be true and how I could distill the scenario in the form of succinct news headlines. After much analysis, I figured out a plausible way that China and the United States could 20 years from now still be international partners despite decades of competition over dwindling energy reserves. I was able to broaden my perspective, make myself open to ideas and possibilities that my own bias hid from me. As I face the future and potential strategic decisions, I need to be as open and responsive as possible.

So tonight, I’m excited to see what my peer think.

In about a week I will be presenting my third Chinese language individual research project at the annual “Mini Monterey Model” event. My past two projects have covered Chinese employment discrimination law as well as Sino-Russian energy cooperation. This year, I am presenting research on the financing of downstream energy infrastructure projects in China. Specifically, I will be looking at a project finance venture in Quanzhou (Fujian Province) undertaken by Saudi Aramco, Exxon Mobil, Sinopec, and the Chinese government.

Between handling interpreters, fielding the often rigourous audience questions, and all the normal things that could/do go wrong with presentations, I am often amazed that I don’t go completely crazy. Nevertheless, these forums have always been a highlight of the semester for me. I actually enjoy public speaking and I also like the feeling that my Chinese language classes have prepared me to do more than tell a cab driver how to get to my hotel. Between this event and final exams in the pipeline, MIIS has got me pretty busy…plenty of stuff to talk about!

Presenting on subjects studied and practiced in the field in a second language, while being simultaneously interpreted, translated into several languages and observed by many multilingual colleagues is a routine most often associated with leading experts and top scholars at high level meetings and conferences.

However, this experience is part of the MIIS routine and gives the GSIPM and GSTILE students a great chance to collaborate in a professional setting. In early December “The Mini-Monterey Model” will showcase the interdisciplinary nature of our students and provide opportunities for policy issues and language, international relations and cross-cultural communication to intersect on the MIIS campus.

I will be presenting on my summer “Development Project Management” Fellowship experience in Peru, certifying clean burning stoves projects for carbon credits, as well as a directed study I completed over two semesters titled “Strategic Partnership & Social Capital Development”, both in Spanish. It will be my first time being simultaneously interpreted and I am looking forward to the opportunity to present to an open audience on campus TWICE!

(I must admit, I am a bit nervous with finals coming up and several other projects and papers due in the same week. Wish me luck!)